Student Center Room 212

Gordon College Counseling Services

Student Center Room 212

678-359-5585

Memory Tips

• Basic Tips

Memory improvement comes from correcting habits and/or thoughts in order to use our memory to its highest potential.

When trying to remember something, try to get as many different kinds of impressions as possible by using all senses. e.g. try reading aloud to yourself.

Try to visualize what you are attempting to remember.

Intend to remember; if you are actively trying to remember you will be able to recall 20-60 percent more of what you read than if you weren’t trying to remember.

It’s often hard to remember a fact or concept if you haven’t used it; think about what you are learning and be able to explain it to someone else.

Try to associate a new idea with facts/ideas that are already firmly lodged in your long term memory.

Review notes often. You will forget more in the first hour after learning than during the next 24 hours and forget more in the first day than in the next 30 days.

• Memory Tools

Journey Method

This technique can be helpful when you are trying to remember a long list of things like the periodic table or all the U.S. Presidents. How it works is you think of some journey you take often (e.g. the drive between school and home). Think of all the landmarks you pass along your route and associate each item on your list with one of your landmarks.

Link and Story Methods

Link the items you are trying to remember to words that sound similar. Then create a short story using those words to help you remember. Say you are trying to remember alist of counties in England. See the example below:

An AVON (Avon) lady is walking up a path toward a strange house. She is hot from the heat of SUMMER (Somerset). Along the path someone has planted CORN in a WALL (Cornwall) and it is beginning to WILT (Wiltshire) because of the heat. When she arrives at the DOOR (Dorset), she knocks and it is opened by her long lost brother named DEVON (Devon).

Acronyms

Acronyms are used frequently in our everyday life. (e.g. ASAP, As Soon As Possible) so why not use them to help you remember items you need to learn for a test? Use the first letter of each term you need to remember to create your own acronymand you’ll be able to remember.

Acrostics

Use the first letter of each word you are trying to remember to create a sentence. For example if you were trying to remember the order of operations in a mathematics equation. PEMDAS (Parentheses, Exponents, Multiply, Divide, Add, Subtract). Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally.